The search for more human remains will continue Wednesday in Linden, and crews expect to excavate the well where they believe bodies were dumped by Wesley Shermantine and Loren Herzog.

On Tuesday, investigators kept sifting through piles of dirt, debris, and lots of mud taken from the well, San Joaquin County Sheriff's Department spokesman Les Garcia said in a 3 p.m. news conference. Already, more than 1,000 bones fragments have been discovered and sifted.

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Crews thought they would excavate the well Tuesday, but that didn't happen due to the amount of work, Garcia said.

So far, 34 piles have been brought to the surface, he added. Of those, the majority contained remains.

Garcia previously said some of the items found include purses, coats, shoes and jewelry.

In his 30 years on the job, this is "the most gruesome crime scene I've been involved with," the spokesman said.

It was the information from the Stockton newspaper reporter that set this search into motion, Garcia said.

Among the investigators is also an anthropologist.

Crews and officials are determined to find as much evidence as possible, Garcia said.

"We're going to do whatever it takes," he added.

In addition to the Linden property, police also are looking into a second well located east. The focus will remain on Linden for now.

The homeowners involved have been very cooperative, Garcia said.

When all is said and done, this case will be submitted to the district attorney.

Although some tentative findings have been released regarding the possible remains of Chevelle Wheeler and Cyndi Vanderheiden, nothing has been confirmed -- and won't be, until the Department of Justice conducts a complete analysis.

The hotline for people with a relative or loved one who may have been a victim of Herzog or Shermantine remains active, Garcia said. So far, about 50 phone calls have come in.

Garcia reminded people, these victims would have died before 2000.

Wednesday's briefing was the last in Linden. Garcia will continue to provide twice-daily updates, but from now on, they will be from the Sheriff's Department headquarters, in French Camp.

Childhood friends Shermantine and Herzog killed for the first time less than three months after their high school graduation in 1984. Then they seemingly killed with impunity for the next 15 years, with one man making boasts about their ability to make people disappear.

By the time the hunting buddies were finally arrested in 1999, investigators say the notorious "Speed Freak Killers" killed as many as 20 people during a 15-year spree that terrorized California's rural Central Valley. Some of their victims were left at the scene. Most were never seen again, especially their female victims.

Even after their convictions in 2001, Wesley Shermantine and Loren Herzog steadfastly refused to divulge any burial sites.

Now, motivated by a bounty hunter's promise to pay $33,000 for the location of the missing, Shermantine is breaking a long silence.

With so many bones and bone fragments being found, questions about who was buried at the well site are on many people's minds.

Private Investigator Rob Dick said for the past decade, he has been looking at dozens of cases that were never solved and fit the description and time frame of the victims of Herzog and Shermantine.

The goal is not to get families hopes up, but I do think we are on the right track," said Dick, who keeps a large binder with the faces of eight possible victims on it.

His list includes women who went missing or disappeared from the region in the 80s.

They just vanished, Dick said. They were out alone, late at night a lot of times. They just vanished.

Many of the victims have little information, like the story of Susan Bender, who was last seen getting into a green van outside a bus station in April 1986, in Modesto.

And then there are others with unusual stories, like Theresa Bier of Fresno, who went into the mountains with a friend in June 1987 to look for Sasquatch and never returned.

Here is a list of the names Dick believes are highly likely to be victims of Herzog and Shermantine, and were likely dumped in the well at or near the site were investigators are now: Sherie Graves, Gayle Marks, Susan Bender, Sylvia Standly, Theresa Bier, Christine Sexton, Kimberly Ann Billy and JoAnn Hobson.